Photos: Protest Leaders Forced to Surrender in Bangkok, Thailand

Downtown Bangkok became a flaming battleground Wednesday as an army assault forced anti-government protest leaders to surrender, enraging followers who shot grenades and set fire to landmark buildings, cloaking the skyline in black smoke.
Using live ammunition, troops dispersed thousands of Red Shirt protesters who had been camped in the capital’s premier shopping and residential district for weeks. Five protesters and an Italian news photographer were killed in the ensuing gunbattles and about 60 wounded.
After Red Shirt leaders gave themselves up to police, rioters set fires at the Stock Exchange, several banks, the headquarters of the Metropolitan Electricity Authority, the Central World, one of Asia’s biggest shopping malls, and cinema that burned to ground. There were reports of looting.
Firefighters retreated after protesters shot guns at them, and thick smoke drifted across the sky of this city of 10 million people.
Sporadic clashes between troops and protesters continued in the night at the site of former protest camp. (AP)

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on Wednesday, May 19th, 2010 at 11:42 am and is filed under World and National News.
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Excellent photos — the entire world and especially the red shirts should see these photos, especially the military’s and Abhisit’s brutal actions against civilians.

David Brown

couple of the captions refer to the demonstrators “fired grenades”

I wonder if there is evidence of this or just repeating a military government myth?

its a big issue in Thailand to discover who has been using grenades around the city for the last couple of months

“independent investigations” have been promised by the government but as usual we expect no result unless the government discovers it can benefit

pip07200

No pic at all of the M79 grenades, assault rifles, bombs etc of the demonstrators which were recovered afterwards by the authorities ? It’d balance the perspective here as to why it looked so violence.

Still, a very sad day for the country.

Ray

Thank you Tim. Ian, obviously the photos also numbed your brain. These images are not overdramatized. This event really happened and was devastating to our country. Do not make light of the pain and suffering that has occurred. There are even more gruesome pictures of soldiers blasted to pieces by the ‘peaceful’ protestors and other unthinkable images. If you have nothing constructive to write then go somewhere else.

Richard Holt

Not a single photo of soldiers or policemen attacked, wounded or killed. Gives the impression that all the shooting was done by government forces which is completely untrue. This is photojournalism at it’s sensationalistic worse. I’m not a pro- or anti-government supporter but the people of Thailand (and I am one) deserve the full story and this is not it.

Mike

I live in Bangkok, Thailand and you would never see such graphic photos in any of the newspapers here, online or print. The media here want the government involvement in the killings to be hushed down and back to business as usual, while labeling the protesters as terrorists and pushing news articles to strengthen that agenda everyday.

monika

Why did you not also show pictures of the wounded soldiers, of the multiple grenades, shotguns, munitions etc found within the “red shirt compound”?

Thanks

James Nakason

Thaksin, we need you to come back to Thailand and win the war here. We need you to be the next Prime Minister again.

I’m an American residing in Thailand 12 years. Yes, sad, but if you’ve got a bad infection (Red Shirts barricaded in downtown Bangkok), sometimes it gets so bad you’ve got to lance it. The government bent over backwards for weeks, trying to accommodate the protesters, some of whom were bent on causing mayhem. When the blister was lanced, the Thai troops went in and did a very mild and professional job. Absolute minimum casualties from the gov’t security forces. The gov’t was as commendable as the paymaster inciter (Mr. Thaksin) was despicable.

bangkokdave

Nice images – but they present a one-sided narrative. Left out of that narrative: red-shirt protesters had an armed wing; they had weapons that included high-powered rifles, M79 grenades, pistols, molotov cocktails, car bombs and much much more. They were aggressive and they ALWAYS fired first. They took Bangkok hostage & tormented its residents while the police failed to lift a finger, leaving the gov’t with no choice but use the army to enforce the law. These are brave soldiers defending Thailand’s shaky democracy – they saved Bangkok with minimum loss of life. Thank God for these brave guys! Thailand owes them.

allan barker

Your reporting has become unspeakable sin. I have lived in Bangkok for 20 years and know exactly what happened, none of which I see here. Worse, you have twisted and discarded facts to create your editor’s dream fantasy world. Do you really think Thai Soldiers with nothing better to do waltzed in and started killing innocent civilians? In all your gory pictures, the entire issue of a well armed and trained militia taht the government had to face that day is summed up in your photo a civilian throwing away 6 marbles????? Are you sick?

Your organization is not alone in its gross disregard for news in search of cheap sensationalism, but yours is about the worst I have seen.

For the first time in my life, I have begun to question all the other “news” that the US media has been feeding the public. For the first time, I’m wondering just how much all the other US news is twisted.

SICA

Fabulous images but the photo comments leave a lot to be desired. Whoever wrote those comments needs to get their facts right. I live in Bangkok, witnessed a lot of the violence and many of the photo comments are just wrong!

As for ‘Ian’ saying ‘photojournalism porn’, get a life, loser. You obviously haven’t got a clue. These photo’s are a 100% true reflection of what i have been living through for the past eight weeks. Crawl back under your rock.

Don Harrelson

This is unfair to make the Thai military look like they were just shooting people at randum. It was not that way at all. The Red Shirts had a good cause but let extremist take over. They held Bangkok hostage for 2 months and put 100,000 Thais out of work. The Thai government tried to negotiate with them to no avail. The Red Shirts left the government no alturnative. Loss of life is not good but neither is the 100,000 without jobs or income. What a mess!

Smedley Butler

Ian you can watch your X factor if you choose. Or your fox news with nonsense about how the market is great while people line up on welfare.

I would rather look at these photos to remind me that this should never happen again.

ThaiExpat

Thank you Denver Post for publishing these images. These will help prevent the illegitimate government of the Democrat Party of Thailand from having free reign to write the script with their lies.

It is obvious that journalists and medics were targeted for assassination. “Safe” zones inside a temple became a free fire range for snipers.

Voices of mediation were ignored by the government and it chose to use murder as its main from of dealing with lawful protesters.

Where were the riot police? (Sidelined by the military.)

The escalation went from a warning, to assault rifles. The shotgun pellets that are used for riot control were fired directly at protesters instead of at the ground first. No batons, no water cannons, not even tear gas grenades.

The presence of international journalists did prevent the bloodbath from becoming far worse.

Curfews continue. People who where not involved in this in any way are being rounded up.

At least one red shirt leader is believed to have been captured and then “disappeared.”

There are no accurate accounts of the number of people arrested, especially in the northeast provinces.

Thank you and your reporters and photographers.

For the time being, please boycott Thailand.

Nam Dindaeng

11
Thai anti-government red shirt protesters weep as their leaders tell them that their protest must end as Thai military forces advance on their position on May 19, 2010 in Bangkok, Thailand. (Photo by Getty Images)
Explanation why we badly cried out: We had been told by our leaders whom brought us to the demonstration camp that if we won, each of our family would get one million Baht. OH NO! WHERE IS THE MONEY YOU PROMISED?

Leeyiankun

Nam Dindaeng, you’re confusing the Reds with the PADs. That was over 2 yrs ago.